Thymic alterations in Plasmodium berghei-infected mice

The primary function of the thymus is to develop immature T-cells into cells that further in the periphery will be able to carry out immune functions. The Literature has shown that thymus can be a target for many pathogens and severe structural alterations take place in this organ during infectious diseases. Here, we investigated if thymus is also a target organ during experimental malaria infection by analyzing the presence of parasites inside the organ and histological alterations in thymuses from Plasmodium berghei NK65-infected BALB/c. After 14 days of infection, parasites were found inside the thymus that presented a profound atrophy with total loss of its architecture. We propose that the presence of parasites in the thymus induces histological modifications that alter the microenvironment, impairing by consequence the successful T cell development. Additional studies are currently being developed in our laboratory to verify if such thymic alterations can influence the systemic immune response to the parasite. (C) 2008 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.